Boys Scouted Out
Posted on August 15, 2005
In Homecoming and A Girl Named Kai, Ron and Kai Ling face hate crimes and diaproval for being homosexual. Discrimination based on sexual identity is rampant among teens and adults and a recent dismissal by the Boy Scouts of America (BSA) testifies to the prejudice still plaguing the country.
Dennis St. Jean began working for the BSA in 1973 and became the the highest-ranking and longest-serving professional scouter in the history of the organization. On January 28, 2005 he was fired suddenly and he believes is because someone in the BSA discovered he was gay. The BSA's regulations forbidding membership to gays and non-theists were not public practices for decades after the organization's inception in 1910. After a few lawsuits and recent pending court cases, the BSA is under a lot of public scrutiny and a declining membership is one of the results.
A recent article by Clint Hendler in Mother Jones discusses St. Jean's termination and sheds light on the consequences of the BSA's discriminatory practices.
Read the entire article.
Related Films: A Girl Named Kai, Homecoming
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